Animal I have Become
by amorae
Summary: Danny is having trouble remaining the helpful little halfa he was when he was fourteen. Ghosts...aren't they almost always blood thirsty criminals? What makes Danny any different? Isn't he just a twisted version of a ghost? Oneshot Songfic


Ooh...Toasteh is bad...very bad...-zips lips-

I can't believe I haven't written anything for so long and I write to write a stupid SONGFIC. -falls over in hysterics-

Anyway...yus this is a songfic to the song Animal I have Become by Three Days Grace, it's only like five lines from the corus but I felt that it really fit what **I **believe is going to eventually happen to Danny-kins if he can't stop it himself (which I think he probably will be able to stop it).

Danny-kins and Sammy-kins are seventeen in this, and they're the only ones I mention in this. Yus, I know you Tucker fans are screaming "nuu, have a fanfiction where Tucker is the main character!" And I want you to know I'm toying with ideas for a TuckerxValerie oneshot, so LEAVE MEH ALONE -winks-

And to those who were waiting for another _chapter_...it's coming, I'm sorry for the wait.

**Disclaimer: I am not Butch Hartman. I am Toasteh, a random fangirl that likes to write depressing fanfictions on poor Danny-kins.**

-giggles- Enjoy, my friends...I actually like this ONESHOT SONGFIC quite a lot...lol

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His sky-blue eyes flashed dangerously to a searing green, warning Sam to back off from him. But Sam wouldn't—couldn't—back away from him. She was worried about the only person she believed she could ever love, and, quite frankly, she didn't want that person to go crazy.

"I'm fine, Sam," Danny breathed in a low voice. Danny wasn't just angry; he was livid. Sam had _no _right to butt into his life, especially at that point of time—it just wasn't a typical action of Sam, and Danny didn't want it to be. He wanted Sam to leave him alone. For at least once in her life.

"Danny, no your _not_." Sam's large amethyst eyes looked up to his emerald ones, concern and worry threatening to spill over her cheekbones. "You've been slowly running away from everything that you once loved! Your family…your friends…you just stay holed up all the time, and I'm not going to lie—we're all worried about you!"

Unable to let Sam's words soak in, for fear that they would throw him off course, he pushed them aside and chose to glare at her. "Sam; nothing's wrong with me that _hasn't happened before_."

She paused, letting a few tears slide down her rosy cheeks from her constant blinking. "That…hasn't happened before?" She tried to rack her brain for the memory of him sinking into a turtle's shell of blissfulness, but never before had he done this. Danny's eyes stayed the same menacing green, keeping the form because of his undying anger.

"Yes, that _hasn't happened before_." As he said the words, pronouncing each syllable with careful correctness, one name flashed through his mind like a beacon; the one human (or ghost) on the whole earth that could ever understand what he was going through. The only other half human, half ghost hybrid. Hadn't he once said, so long ago, that Danny would join him? _I didn't believe him at the time_, Danny thought bitterly. _I guess he was right all along. Damn him, Vlad._

Danny fought an inner battle since his fifteenth birthday. When he was fifteen, he started wondering why…as a _ghost_ that the whole town hated…he was protecting them. Why was he risking _his _neck to save ten or twenty people that he didn't even know, and who would undeniably report his appearance to the local news? Why didn't he just go and join the ghosts he hated, and get some glory instead of this sinking foreboding that he would someday be found out?

For a whole year he counter fought these strange thoughts, but they did get more and more vivid as time went on. By his sixteenth birthday he was slowly deteriorating, shunning all things human and enveloping himself in the depths of darkness. He, of course, still hunted ghosts; but he did it with an air that suggested he was rather sorry he was doing this to his fellow ghosts. And each ghost he hunted noticed; Skulker came back, numerous times, to mock Danny and tell him he was giving in.

And Danny knew he was, sadly.

"Danny, what do you mean?" Sam, who was standing next to Danny's bed, slowly sank into it. She sat still for a moment until turning her head sluggishly towards Danny. Danny didn't know what she was thinking, but he was sure it wasn't anything she wanted to believe. He was also sure, however, that it was probably very close to the truth; or, at least close enough to give that hard edge in Sam's eye a deeper look.

"It's happened before, Sam. Not to me, but to someone else." He forced his angry eyes to calm down and shift back to ice-blue. It was no use making Sam think he was angry…or angrier than normal. The truth was, he was normally angry. He was seventeen, and constantly thought of ways to just slip into the ghost zone and beg Vlad for help. But he fought each back, but he grew weaker and weaker each time the thought popped up. _No one_ would be able to stop him once he decided what his fate would be.

_Somebody get me through this nightmare_

Sam still looked rather shell-shocked as she answered Danny's statement with another question. "To…to who?"

Danny's eyes hardened despite his efforts to keep them calm. His face contorted slightly, revealing harsh likes that creased into his face violently. "You _know _who, Sam. Don't pretend that you don't know."

Knowing, as Danny said, who the person must have been, Sam jumped up into the air and let out an angry squeal. "Danny, no! You went three years without sinking that low! How come…how come you're saying you're…becoming like Vlad?"

"Because it's true."

"No, it's not Danny!"

"How would you know?" Danny snapped, unable to stay calm. "You've never had to go through what we've been through! You're still _human_, you're still _alive_. You try going through each day having to carry the burden that if a doctor were to take your temperature, they'd declare you _stone cold dead_—yet _you still walk around and breathe_! Until you've lived through it, Sam, you have no idea how degrading it is. Is it any wonder that Vlad snapped? No, I'm starting to think it's not! I've been dead for three years, Sam, and don't you think that knowledge would get to you, too, eventually?"

_I can't control myself_

Sam, speechless, sat very still on the bed. Her chest rose and fell rapidly as she tried to calm her racing heart. Danny, on the other hand, realized that he could sometimes go quite a few minutes without having to breathe; there were some times when he couldn't find his own heartbeat. _I think not being able to find your beat in gym class—because its non existent—is enough reason for anyone to feel slightly different_, he thought, concealing a rather malicious laugh.

"Danny, I…," Sam stuttered, but the words died as her lips touched them. Her chest was still rising and falling, but not as rapidly as it had been. Danny tried to put out the little flame of jealousy that had erupted in his human half; his jealousy towards Sam that she could not go more than two minutes without breathing.

Taking a deep breath, Sam continued, "Danny—I don't…I don't care if you're…you're dead. You know Tucker and I would defend you until the end…you know we'd help you if you'd come to us. Why don't you think we would do that? Only a horrible friend wouldn't help. I know your part ghost, Danny, but you can't give up so easily. I suppose if I were part ghost I'd be thinking the same thing as you, but…but you can't give up!"

She stood up, boldly, and literally jumped over the bed and in front of Danny. Danny, rather startled, couldn't do anything as Sam snatched his limp and pale hands from his side. She held both of them in her hands, stroking them slightly. She ran her smooth fingers over the many calluses and bumps that lined his. Danny's face darkened as he tried to pull away from Sam's grasp, but Sam held tight.

"Let go of me, Sam," he said in a dangerous voice. Sam glared up into the turquoise eyes she had always loved.

"No," she told him boldly. "I want you to know that I won't leave you. Not now…not _ever_. I don't care if you're dead—I just don't want to lose my best friend!"

Danny's eyes squinted into narrow slits. Should he tell her that she had already lost her best friend? That her best friend was just a flicker of a shadow now? That her best friend was gone, as far as he was concerned?

_So what if you can see the darkest side of me_

"You've already lost him, Sam," Danny said coldly. "You lost him when you told him to go into the ghost portal."

Stung by his harsh words, Sam let the tears flow from her eyes and cascade down her face in a waterfall. She still clutched Danny's hands in front of her, holding tight to them for what she thought was dear life.

"I didn't lose you then," she whispered, looking down at their hands rather than up at his cold and inscrutable face. "I lost you when you turned sixteen."

Laughing harshly, Danny yanked his hands away from Sam's grasp, causing her to become off balance. "That was a year after I began to realize what I have become."

Sam glared up into his face, praying that her eyes didn't reveal the emotions of fear she was feeling at that moment. Danny was _so_ much stronger than he was a year ago; even six months ago. "You haven't become anything, Danny. You're just…confused and upset."

Danny's lips curved into a sickening sneer. "No, I'm sorry, but you're wrong. Haven't you realized that every ghost in the ghost zone, besides ten or so, become blood thirsty criminals? You have to have realized. And don't say 'why can't you be one of the ten or so,' because I'm positive the temptation to…become more ghost-like is stronger when you're a half ghost. Nothing you say will change that, Sam; nothing you wish will warp reality."

_No one will ever change this animal that I have become_

Sam's eyes glistened like crystals as she backed away from Danny. She couldn't help herself; she was getting rather scared of him. It made her positively angry that she was letting herself become fearful of the one person she swore she'd stay by for all eternity. But she couldn't help it…he was acting so…well, so _ghost_-like, and so _un_-Danny-like. It scared her.

"I still don't believe you," Sam whispered faintly. But even she could see through the flimsy lie; the more Danny talked, the more she began to believe that what he was saying was an unfortunate reality. The more she let his dark words entwine around her beliefs of pureness, the more those thoughts gained shadows. It made her even angrier that her will to believe Danny was, and would always be, the sweet and calm kid she had known when they were fourteen—that had a…different flair to himself—was still alive. But the old Danny was just a shimmer in a reflective glass, a ghost of the past. People change; people differ. The new Danny is what she had, now. This new Danny—seventeen, and more ghostly than she had ever seen him.

"Sam…just give in. You know it's true," Danny said quietly. "You know about Vlad. You know he changed also…except he changed while lying in a hospital bed. Maybe it's even worse for me, because I actually have gotten used to my powers—at least a little bit."

Still keeping her distance, she locked her gaze on Danny's. Danny tried to look away from the tear-stained face, but was entranced by it. "But…Vlad changed because he was angry; he was angry at your dad for creating him."

A bitter smile crept onto Danny's face as he realized what Sam was hinting towards. "No, Sam, you didn't…you didn't cause me to want to change. I'm not angry with you for sending me into the portal. I guess I feel as if it was…fate?" He shrugged, passing it off as an unimportant fact.

"How can you talk about this so _calmly_?" Sam asked, exasperated, after a few moments. Danny's eyes traveled from the window back to Sam's rising and falling chest. He didn't know why, but seeing her breathe seemed to clam him down, even if it was just slightly.

"I'm not sure," Danny whispered softly. "I guess…I guess I've just accepted it. After all…I've been feeling this way for two years."

"Don't except it!" Sam begged, still staring at his face. His eyes were still locked onto her breathing habits.

"Too late," Danny answered in a calm voice. "I already have. I may not…well, I may not want to be a ghost, but…but it's _the real me_. Fate chose this for me…and I'm going to have to follow through with his cruel plans."

_Help me believe it's not the real me_

Sam looked away from his face and down at her hands. The bracelets that she had worn since she was in eighth grade—or maybe even longer—still clutched her wrists like snakes. She absently pushed them up as far as they would go, and then back down towards the bone in the thumb that always prevented them from slipping off her wrists.

"Oh, Danny," she mumbled darkly. "Why did you let yourself be corrupted?" Sam desprately missed the quiet and shy freshman she had fallen in love with. This new snappy and depressed senior wasn't the person she loved.

"I didn't…I just wizened up." His face hardened slightly as he looked away from Sam and down at his dresser. "Sam, look at me. Can't you see that _I'm not breathing as much as humans normally do_? Wouldn't you change your outlook on life…even slightly…if you couldn't find your heart beat as regularly as you were supposed to?" Danny fought to keep his tears back. "Face it, Sam—I'm not the stupid little halfa you once knew. I'm…I guess I'm a ghost, or something that's damn close."

He swallowed harshly as Sam took a large, shuttering breath. "I miss the stupid little halfa."

"I do too," Danny whispered, too low for Sam to hear. He bowed his head and raised a distressed eye towards her. "I think you know what I'm going to do now, don't you."

It wasn't a question, and Sam knew it. She nodded, not trusting her voice to carry the message without adding a "please don't leave me," or something that would just depress Danny even more and make him leave quicker.

"I'm leaving so I don't completely change. You…you've probably noticed how angry I've been…of course you have, I screamed at you after all…anyway…I _know _if I stay here _I'll _wind up attacking Amity Park."

Sam started crying silently once more, unable to hold back the tears any longer. She nodded, biting her lip. She didn't notice the tangy taste of blood as it filled her mouth from the cut on her lips.

"I love you; you know that, right, Danny?" Sam asked carefully.

Danny looked at her wearily, his sharp blue eye barely visible in his mass of black hair. "Yeah, I guess. I…I loved you too, I think."

_Somebody help me tame this animal I have become_

Sam wanted to hug Danny, but knew better of it.

"Don't tell anyone anything, okay?" Danny begged. Sam nodded as two rings of light erupted in the middle of Danny's stomach. He quickly changed into his ghost form, his black hair turning white, his blue eyes turning a haunting green.

"Maybe I'll be back," he muttered. Sam stood, weak kneed, as Danny went intangible and fazed through the floor and into the basement.


End file.
